


Can't Do Right for Being Wrong

by OTPs4Ever



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Comfort, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-18
Updated: 2019-02-18
Packaged: 2019-10-30 21:11:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17836277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OTPs4Ever/pseuds/OTPs4Ever
Summary: An imagined scene between Season 2 Episodes 5 and whatever's coming.  Michael and Ash share a tender moment.





	Can't Do Right for Being Wrong

**Author's Note:**

> We know he's staying on board and we know there's a kiss. And he ends up back in a Starfleet uniform (see promos and Mary Chieffo's Demi Lovato video). What's here is a product of impatient imagination.

Tilly was exhausted, by her experience in the network and by the emotions that followed it. She had been given the option of a sleep cycle under the watchful eyes of Discovery’s medical personnel but had chosen to recuperate in her quarters.

Michael had left her sleeping when she went for her shift on the bridge, and found her still asleep when she returned. She knew how much she needed sleep herself but was less sure that it would come. Her concern for her foster brother gnawed in a place that discipline could not reach; a place where, since he had been on Kronos, she had kept her feelings for Ash.

She completed her sleep-time ritual with more care than usual, hoping that it would calm the inner disturbance. She continued the breathing exercises that were part of that ritual even as she slipped into bed and rested her head on her pillow.

After an hour she opened her eyes, acknowledging that on this occasion the ritual had not worked.

It was disturbing in every way: that suddenly he was on board the ship, that the liaison role that put him there had no time limit. And that she didn’t know where his work would place him, or where he had been quartered.

But above all, that she didn’t know which iteration of Ash Tyler had come back. He had looked bigger during the first and last conversation they had had while he was still on Kronos. She couldn’t remember the details of his appearance very well – his hair had been different, and his clothing – but he had seemed broader, stronger, sleeker even. More impressive. Her heart sank, and she felt hollow, thinking that that was the Voq in him, flourishing in his home environment. Then hollowness turned to compassion, when she considered how that apparent strength was also a manifestation of an uncertain Ash, projecting outwards as well as he could those qualities that would keep him on the same footing as Klingons who had not been engineered into an outwardly human form.

That was the Ash she had found in the mess: body folded over, legs too long to fit under the table, _too_ tall, _too_ big to hide himself as he wanted to, not least from the security officer eyeing him steadily from across the room. His clothing reflected his new environment, but that’s all it was – an outer layer expressing an intention to belong rather than an expression of actually belonging. Had he chosen it for himself? How could he endure it, sustain it, going from one shell to another? – Voq in his albino-colored finery, Lieutenant Ash Tyler in Starfleet blue and then cruel Terran black, Torchbearer to L’Rell in armoured leather, and now the indistinct garb of a neither-military-nor-civilian Section 31 operative.

It didn’t look well on him. He had talked of finding, in Section 31, a place where a misfit could fit in, but that fitting in hadn’t happened yet. His painful discomfort had been obvious from the moment she saw him. How could he feel anything less returning to a ship where a man had been killed by his hand? And where he would encounter the man who had been widowed by that killing? The look of bewildered horror that Stamets had given him, when they had actually come face to face on the bridge, must have been as bad as anything that Ash had imagined.

Or, as agonising as it was, perhaps Ash welcomed it, as a price to be paid on the path to atonement. She knew about that. Was she not seeking it every day in her service on Discovery? And in her quest to find the brother that she had purposefully estranged? But she had an advantage: she had friends; family, in fact. And he seemed so alone. She had told him that the work of rebuilding himself was solitary, had to be so. But for the first time she wondered if it would finally be too much for him. When they had said goodbye on Kronos, she had felt his sadness but also his resolve to do something right. Now that too, that purpose, had been taken from him. And if Section 31 was made of people like the Terran emperor, it may prove to be more damaging to his recovery than life on Kronos.

Even a man as good as Captain Pike had questioned his presence on the ship. She had defended it, stating that it was Voq who had killed Dr Culber, not Tyler. But she doubted that Ash’s handlers in Section 31 made such a fine distinction. She doubted that they cared at all. He was of use to them – a soldier, a human with a unique level of intelligence about all things Klingon – that was as far as their consideration of him would go. 

_He needs to be somewhere away from all of this _she found herself thinking. For the first time, it occurred to her that he should be back on earth, receiving treatment, getting respite.__

__It was this thought that finally propelled her out of bed. She had to walk. She imagined him in some therapeutic facility: clean, white rooms, sunlight, plants, quiet voices, caring words. Family. He had to have some family. She found her eyes welling up with tears and hurried to pull on her uniform. While he had been on Kronos it had been safe to care about him; when he had contacted her with his warning about L’Rell’s position she had even told him ‘You’ve got me’. It occurred to her now that, even as he heard the words come out of her mouth, he had to remember how she had turned her back on him when he most needed her._ _

__‘I can’t find my way back without you.’_ _

__His words came back to her as clear as the moment he had uttered them. And what if it was true? Was she strong enough for the weight of his need? The war was not long over; the loss of their treacherous captain was still fresh. Everyone on board Discovery, they all had wounds to heal. But not one of them had a doubt, she was sure, that their training, their values and their camaraderie would get them through. Shouldn’t he be allowed to be part of that?_ _

__She slowed her pace and felt a welcome sense of lightness: whether he was on earth, or on Discovery, part of Starfleet or of Section 31, it was not for her to decide. Even now, after facing a lifetime in prison for thinking she knew best, did she really still think that she knew best? She smiled to herself, at her foolish impulses. Spock’s situation was desperate, but there was no expectation that she alone had to fix it. The answer to the mystery of the seven signals, that too would be found as a result of a combined effort. If she were to play a part in Ash’s recovery, she might play a special role, but she would not do it unaided._ _

__Perhaps – and a quiet joy she had not felt since they were together accompanied the next tentative thought – perhaps it would be alright to care about him after all. Perhaps – and her heart ached – she could allow herself to love him again._ _

__She had been walking almost in a trance and realised that she was approaching his old quarters. In the next moment, she saw Ash up ahead, coming from the other direction. He came to a stop in the doorway, about to go in._ _

__She stopped in her tracks, wondering if she could turn back before she was seen. But he had already glanced in her direction._ _

__There was no other option but to keep going until she was standing in front of him._ _

__“It wasn’t my intention to…” she stammered, “I mean to say, I did not think you would be quartered here, I couldn’t sleep, and somehow” -_ _

__He smiled, a gentle, understanding smile._ _

__“I couldn’t sleep either. To be honest, I keep wondering where I even am!”_ _

__“Yes,” she replied, taking in the shadows on his face. “I was thinking – you have had many transitions to deal with, and those before you have even had a chance to settle into one situation.”_ _

__He took a step toward her._ _

__“You’ve been thinking about me?”_ _

__It reminded her of the Ash she had first met. That dimpled smile a little cocksure, but with an underlying restraint that made his boldness charming._ _

__She clasped her hands together in front of her, rubbed one with the other. “I” –_ _

__He took one of her hands. He looked at her, as though he was about to say something, but then the moment for speaking passed and she found that he was tugging her gently toward him._ _

__For the moment they were alone. It might not be the right thing to do but – she found herself putting her arms around him and resting her head against his chest. His hands came up, one around her shoulders, the other cradling her head._ _

__“It’s good to have you back,” she managed to say._ _

__“It’s good to be back,” he replied, his voice whispering into her hair. “I might not know where I am. But I know where I belong.” He continued so quietly that she could barely hear him: “Right here.”_ _

__Somehow her hands came to be resting on his chest and his hands to be resting over them, lovingly, protectively._ _

__She heard someone approaching and pulled away from him, holding her hands behind her. But she held his eyes, smiling. It was a smile not just for him but for herself, an acknowledgement of just how wrong she could continue to be._ _

__“You once said something about my capacity to love,” she said. “And how it brought you back to who you are. But you overlooked something, and I have overlooked it too – your own capacity to love, and be loved. It gives me strength, and hope. That all will be well for you, Ash.”_ _

_And for us,_ she allowed herself to wonder, as she said goodnight and made her way back to her quarters. 


End file.
